The Path to Town
by crazysockmonkeys
Summary: A four-year-old Daphne finds herself walking to town all by herself.


"Come along, Miss Anastasia," whispered Daphne to her favorite rag doll. "Let's go outside."

She fingered the facial features of the doll while she sat on the stairs, her four-year-old mind imagining something beautiful. It was plain, handmade by her grandmother; made of white cloth with a red paisley dress and black thread eyes.

Sitting on the steps was easy for Daphne. Below her were her parents, screaming at each other in love or hate, and above her were her brothers, their growing feet slamming against the hardwood floors, their voices full of laughter and screams.

It was five in the afternoon, and fall had come so it was darker than usual, but she wanted to go outside, to play in the leaves again. So she did. Standing up, she crept down the steps so no one would hear her then ducked out the door, not even bothering to grab something to keep her warm.

Once she had gotten there, she jumped off the porch and into the waiting leaves below, Miss Anastasia directly behind her. She giggled, lay back, and looked up at the colorful sky. Her long brown hair sank into the crispness, and her hands pinched a singular leaf until it was as crumbs.

She could still hear the shouting inside and the uproar upstairs. She wished she could fly suddenly.

"I feel like taking a trip into town," she whispered to Miss Anastasia. "Do you?"

She didn't wait for her answer. She placed the doll on the porch and whispered, "I'll be back soon. I think I'm going to go for a shop."

And so off the little girl went, bits of failed greenery in her hair, away from home and away from dark familiarity.

Daphne knew the way into the main part of Manchester somehow. Her path was the side of a road, the place next to it a footpath carved out of overgrown grass. She walked for what seemed like forever to her, and perhaps it would have seemed as such to an adult. By car, it took five minutes to get into town.

Night inevitably fell. Wind blew on her face and seemed to bring the mystery of the coming dark, and just as Daphne found the city sidewalk, the absence of light came to pass.

Her worn, patent leather shoes scraped the red bricks of the ground as she walked quickly. The cold crept around her arms but she didn't notice, and she kept walking blissfully.

It didn't occur to her that she had never gone anywhere by herself before, nor did it trouble her that she was without her parents. She saw everything as if she were an eager young woman in a paisley dress, just like her Miss Anastasia.

When Daphne began to really look around her, she realized that she had seen some of these things before, and in front of her she saw Lane's Grocery, a place where she had gone with her mother before.

_They sell biscuits there,_ she thought. _The blueberry ones. Mum can't find those anywhere else._

She pulled herself high like a proper lady as her small fingers gripped the golden doorknob and she pushed it open, causing a sweet bell to ring.

Rosie Lane pushed her glowing red hair out her face as she looked to the door and saw her. To Rosie, the girl looked familiar, and by the warm lighting of the grocery she looked and wondered how such a little one had gotten here.

"Hello there, Mrs. Lane," said Daphne. "Do you have any biscuits I could have? Maybe blueberry ones?"

"You're the little Moon girl, aren't you?" Said Rosie. "Where's your Mum? I don't need to ask where your Dad is." Her husband Richard had told her enough about the consistently drunken Harry Moon.

"Me Mum's at home. I came into town for a shop, I did."

"You walked? From that little house you have that far away?"

"I didn't walk. I took me carriage."

Rosie sighed. "You don't even have a jumper on. I think I might need to have a word with your mum when we get to your house. I need to get my jumper and a torch. Richard's taken the car, we're going to have to walk.

"We can take me carriage. There's plenty of room for you in there!"

"I'm sure there is, love. Come on, your mum's gonna be worrying her head about you, and if she isn't I'll make her worry when we get there."

Daphne followed Rosie to the back of the store, where she was wrapped in a blanket after Rosie took her coat from a hook and grabbed her flashlight.

They walked hand in hand while still bathed in city lights, but once they were faced with the rest of the walk near the road, a womanly instinct became Rosie and she picked Daphne up.

Daphne sank her face into the woman's shoulder, really thinking for the first time. Her mum and dad weren't going to be very happy with her when she got back. She had run away from home, she realized.

"This is your home, isn't it, love?" Asked Rosie when they had reached her house.

"Yes, that's it."

"Come along dear."

Rosie knocked promptly on the door four times and waited. Gertrude Moon opened the door and when she saw her daughter, her eyes looked relieved. "Thank the Lord."

She took Daphne from Rosie and put her on her hip. "Ah, my Daphne. I was worried you were lost."

"Hi, Mummy."

Putting her down, she looked at Rosie carefully. "Thank you, Rosie."

"You really should watch her more carefully."

"I do the best that I can, but I don't think you should be pointing any fingers. I've gave birth to nine children and you haven't even birthed one."

Rosie studied Gertrude's already aged face, her blonde hair coming out of a bun tied to the back of her head.

"Easy now, Gert," said a pipe-smoking Harry Moon, who was sitting in a chair near the fireplace.

"Shut your bloody pie whole!" Gertrude said to her husband.

"I'm just saying maybe she wouldn't have run off if you had watched this little thing!"

"You better get out of here now. You saved my daughter and you're a decent woman. Don't let me opinion of you change."

"I just want what's best for this girl! And for all those boys! I can hear 'em making a fuss upstairs."

"You're just jealous, you are! Jealous of my precious little girl 'cause you can't have any of your own!"

"That's none of your business!"

"You get out of my house! You get out of my house right now, Rosie Lane!"

"Gert—"

"Not another word out of you, Harry! I want you out."

Rosie stuck up her chin. "Fine. I've had enough of you. You aren't welcome in our shop anymore. But you are, Daphne. You want a biscuit, you can come get one from me."

"Get on," said Gertrude, softer now, and she closed the door behind Rosie.

There was a long pause, until Daphne said. "Mummy, Daddy, I'm sorry I went to town."

Gertrude sighed. "It's all right, sweetheart. Go on to bed. Mummy and Daddy love you, now."

Daphne nodded and went up the stairs, her shoes slapping against the wooden steps until she reached her bedroom. On her bed sat Miss Anastasia. Mummy must have put her there. She changed into her nightdress, climbed into bed and whispered, "Miss Anastasia, don't go into town anymore."


End file.
